{"id":27565,"date":"2021-10-22T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-22T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cancer.gov\/news-events\/cancer-currents-blog\/2021\/hpv-vaccine-parents-safety-concerns"},"modified":"2024-11-03T15:14:11","modified_gmt":"2024-11-03T15:14:11","slug":"despite-proven-safety-of-hpv-vaccines-more-parents-have-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/despite-proven-safety-of-hpv-vaccines-more-parents-have-concerns\/","title":{"rendered":"Despite Proven Safety of HPV Vaccines, More Parents Have Concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Credit: National Cancer Institute<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Despite more than 15 years of consistent evidence that HPV vaccines are safe and effective, a new study has found that more parents are citing concerns about the vaccines\u2019 safety in recent years. The findings highlight an urgent need for doctors and public health leaders to address these concerns with parents, according to the scientists who led the study.<\/p>\n

The HPV vaccine<\/a> protects against six different kinds of cancer (cervical, anal, back of the throat, penile, vaginal, and vulvar) that are caused by infection with the human papillomavirus<\/a>, or HPV. <\/p>\n

The vaccine is recommended for girls and boys aged 11 or 12. Although vaccination rates have been rising since the first HPV vaccine was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2006, only 59% of 13- to 17-year-olds were fully vaccinated in 2020<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Some parents have always cited concerns about safety for declining to get the HPV vaccine for their kids. But from 2015 to 2018, the study showed, the percentage of parents who declined the HPV vaccine for their kids due to safety concerns nearly doubled<\/a>. During the same time frame, reports of serious health issues after HPV vaccination were consistently rare, the study found. <\/p>\n

Results from the study were published September 17 in JAMA Network Open<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was really shocking to me to see this parallel analysis of parental perceptions and statements about safety and the actual safety results, and they\u2019re going in opposite directions,” said Robin Vanderpool, Dr.P.H., chief of NCI\u2019s Health Communication and Informatics Research Branch<\/a>, who wasn\u2019t involved in the study. “I think it\u2019s really telling.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOur suspicion is that the rising safety concerns are probably being driven by [the] use of social media and people trying to find vaccine information online,\u201d said the study\u2019s lead researcher, Kalyani Sonawane, Ph.D., of UTHealth School of Public Health in Houston, Texas.<\/p>\n

The study looked at data from 2015 to 2018, Dr. Vanderpool noted, well before the COVID-19 pandemic and rising hesitancy around COVID-19 vaccines. \u201cMy worry is that you\u2019re going to have a synergy or convergence, and [HPV vaccine hesitancy] might get worse,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe public health and cancer control communities should be thinking about how to address this potential outcome through both health communication research and public health practice,\u201d Dr. Vanderpool added.<\/p>\n

Fewer Health Issues after Vaccination<\/h2>\n

To look at trends in health issues reported after HPV vaccination, the researchers turned to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS)<\/a>, a website operated by CDC and FDA. Patients, caregivers, health care professionals, and vaccine manufacturers can use VAERS to voluntarily report any health problems that occur after vaccination. <\/p>\n

From 2015 to 2018, reports of health issues following HPV vaccination went down overall.<\/p>\n

Reports of serious health issues after HPV vaccination were consistently rare\u2014around 1.8 per 100,000 HPV vaccine doses, or 0.0018%. A total of 758 serious health problems that arose after HPV vaccination were reported in VAERS during that time. Meanwhile, the rate of nonserious health issues following HPV vaccination reported in VAERS dropped from 43 to 28 per 100,000 vaccine doses.<\/p>\n

Just because a health problem is reported in VAERS doesn\u2019t mean the vaccine caused it, Dr. Sonawane cautioned. Some health reports were hearsay and lacked sufficient information to be verified, she added. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to be cautious about interpreting VAERS data and not make any cause\u2013effect associations,\u201d she said. According to CDC and FDA, VAERS data can only be used to find unusual patterns that should be evaluated in additional studies.<\/p>\n

Another CDC-funded vaccine safety program, the Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD)<\/a>, also performs vaccine safety studies, including those based on reports to VAERS. A recent VSD study of the 9-valent HPV vaccine (Gardasil 9<\/a>), for example, tracked new vaccinations over a 2-year period and identified no new safety issues<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More Parents Citing Safety Concerns<\/h2>\n

The researchers also looked at results from a large, CDC-led survey of parents of teens aged 13 to 17. From 2015 to 2018, more than 39,000 caregivers of teens who had not received the HPV vaccine responded to the survey and selected 1 of 31 reasons for declining the vaccine. <\/p>\n

The top five selected reasons were:<\/p>\n